27. The Learning Table: Crafting a Community of Motivated, Impactful Team Members with Dr. Carrie Graham

Also available on YouTube!

In this episode of The Impact Ripple podcast, I had the pleasure of chatting with my brilliant friend and colleague, Dr. Carrie Graham, an expert in effective training for adult learners.

If you have or are growing your team, you will need to provide them with training. Whether it’s new hire training or opportunities to help them grow and develop during their time with you, training is critical for having a profitable, sustainable, and impactful team.

However, training can also feel super overwhelming! Where do you start? How do you not bore your team to tears? And what can you do to make sure the training actually sticks?

Well, lucky for you, all the answers to these questions (and more) are waiting inside of Episode 27 of The Impact Ripple podcast for you right now!

Dr. Carrie kicks things off by encouraging us to challenge the status quo of checkbox-style training and explore the magic of making every training opportunity a value-driven, engaging conversation. She also drops some serious truth bombs about how shifting from performative to intentional training can make all the difference.

We geek out about the importance of understanding adult learners' past experiences and how those experiences can be leveraged as mental models. Dr. Carrie introduced the concept of a "learning table," to develop a greater sense of community and motivation. I loooooved this part of our conversation and think you will too!

We dive deep into the three key areas for adult learners and Dr. Carrie unveiled her ERA framework – Engagement, Retention (Comprehension), and Application – urging business owners to keep it simple and make training a breeze. Hello, where have you been all our life, Dr. Carrie?! We also talked about how to reframe mistakes as opportunities for growth, emphasizing the importance of comprehensive support throughout the entire training journey.

The big takeaway? Engage authentically, support comprehension and retention, and make sure your team can apply that knowledge in real-life situations. Forget the traditional learning style categories – it's all about personalization and meeting the actual needs of your team!

This is a juicy episode, so grab your notepad and pen and dive on in! I can’t wait to hear what you think of my conversation with the incredible Dr. Carrie Graham.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How to turn mundane training into engaging conversations that stick.

• Dr. Carrie’s ERA Framework for simple, yet highly effective training.

• The importance of moving away from dull, checkbox-style training to personalized, intentional methods that resonate with adult learners.

• How to leverage your team's past experiences as powerful mental models, fostering community and motivation.

• Why viewing mistakes as growth opportunities, coupled with comprehensive support, will fuel your team's success.

Mentioned in This Episode: 

• Dr. Carrie’s Website: www.drcarriegraham.com

• Connect with Dr. Carrie on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drcarriegraham/

• Book a Free Call – www.sprouthr.co/call 

Transcription for Episode 27 - The Learning Table: Crafting a Community of Motivated, Impactful Team Members with Dr. Carrie Graham

Ashley Cox (she/her) (00:02.634)

Welcome to the Impact Ripple podcast, the go-to source for hiring and leadership made simple, doable, and fun for visionary female business owners. I'm your host, Ashley Cox, author, certified HR expert, and founder of Sprout HR. And I believe that you don't have to change who you are to be a great leader because you already are one. Join me as we kiss uncertainty and overwhelm goodbye and say hello to the tools and support you need to grow a profitable, sustainable, impactful team with more confidence and ease. 

On today's episode, I'm joined by the brilliant Dr. Carrie Graham for a deep dive conversation into best practices for training your growing team. Dr. Carrie Graham is an adult learning strategist and training consultant who helps businesses improve employee engagement in learning, information retention, and long-term skills application by developing a customized learning journey for employees and clients. She collaborates with executives to establish strategies that improve employee training outcomes, offering immediate solutions and 50% long-term improvement. In this episode, Carrie shares her philosophy around training, learning, and development. She breaks down some common mistakes, misunderstandings, and myths about training.

And she shares how to create training with her signature three-part approach, making it more effective, efficient, and full of ease for busy leaders. Because we know you don't have time to say the same thing three times. My favorite part of our conversation was our discussion around why engagement is more important than entertainment when creating and delivering training to your team. And what the difference is so that you can maximize your training efforts. Carrie's explanation is so good. You are definitely not gonna wanna miss this part of today's episode. Now, here's my conversation with Dr. Carrie Graham.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (00:04.285)

Hey there and welcome to The Impact Ripple Carrie. I am so thrilled to have you on the show today and I'm just thank you so much for being here.

Carrie Graham, PhD (00:14.286)

Oh, Ashley, I am equally delighted to be here. It is such an honor, but more importantly, I think it's a joy. I'm excited for where our conversation is going to go. And, you know, I'm confident that your listeners will get something out of it, but I'm ready to have a chat with you.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (00:31.225)

Yes, I have absolutely zero doubts whatsoever that people are gonna walk away with so much value from our conversation today. So if you are listening, grab your notepad, grab your pen, you're probably gonna wanna take a lot of notes. And if you're walking and you're listening to this episode, because a lot of times I say, throw your earbuds in, go get you a little bit of learning and development, then this may be an episode you wanna come back and listen to again and again. But Carrie and I met a few years ago which feels like a lifetime, you know, in this, in this post pandemic world and this weird time warp that we're in. And I tell you, we hit it off right away, didn't we, Carrie?

Carrie Graham, PhD (01:10.358)

We really did. Even then, it was as if we had known each other for years.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (01:14.441)

for years. Like we did not miss a beat. I think our first phone call or our first Zoom call was like two or three hours.

Carrie Graham, PhD (01:22.421)

I think you might be right.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (01:23.709)

Yeah, and every time we've gotten on a call, we're like, we should just block a bunch of time because we're gonna be here for a minute.

Carrie Graham, PhD (01:30.21)

Absolutely, absolutely. There's no 30 minute calls with us, none.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (01:34.277)

Yes, yes, exactly. Well, except for maybe today's podcast recording. So that way you're not stuck here for two or three hours on the world's longest podcast episode listening. But we're gonna really keep it to that like 30, 40 minutes today, but we're gonna pack it with so much value that it's gonna feel like it's two or three hours worth of content, I think.

Carrie Graham, PhD (01:54.894)

I think so, and you and I will just continue the conversation offline. And if it needs to be a part two, it's a part two for your people.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (01:58.821)

Yeah, exactly. I mean, it could be a whole podcast season, but I digress. So I'm excited because Carrie and I have a shared background in training and development, but hers is a little bit deeper than mine. She's got a lot of experience, a lot of knowledge, a lot of wisdom, a lot of training and education, and I'm so excited to be able to...

Carrie Graham, PhD (02:05.506)

Yeah.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (02:25.801)

bring that to you as a visionary small woman business owner who's listening into this conversation today because this is the level of training and education that we don't always get as small business owners. This is something that a lot of times folks who've been in corporate like myself, we spend a lot of time and a lot of money on training and development for people in corporate and we don't have necessarily that same opportunity or access in the small business world. And so I'm thrilled to introduce Carrie to you as our listeners today because she's accessible for you. And I love that so much. So I'm excited to really just share your brilliance, Carrie, with our listeners today. So let's start off with an easy question. Or maybe it's not so easy because all of our journeys are a little winding to get to where we are. And I know that yours is no different. But tell us a little bit about your journey how you came to be doing the work that you're doing today.

Carrie Graham, PhD (03:27.894)

Yeah, so I'm gonna go way back and say, and just remember this little tidbit, I was a really shy child. Very shy and I have a younger sister, 13 years younger, but so I basically was an only child and that has helped me today. So moving forward, I have a background, a professional background in healthcare as a healthcare provider for a number of years. And with that came training people and educating people on their bodies and the healing process. And then it turned into me being a faculty member. And that is where the true, my true training came in terms of how do you set expectations set goals and outcomes and then what are the things that you need to do to meet them? 

Effectively and efficiently and so with the height of all of the global shutdowns I left higher education and started consulting and my PhD is specifically in adult learning and workplace learning and so I have a Significant ear to not only the end user so the learner but also for those individuals who are attempting to support them. So I told you the little bit about my background growing up because one of the things that people that work with me often say is, Carrie you're incredibly calm, incredibly calming, and you listen with such intent, intention that whenever you ask a question or you're helping to explain something, it's as if you were inside of my brain.

Carrie Graham, PhD (05:10.784)

And to me that's the greatest compliment ever and I have to say it lends back to when I was a child and listening, right? I was really shy so I did a lot of listening. As a health care provider, I did a lot of listening and collecting information quickly to you know come to an accurate decision. And the same holds true in my work today as I can sense anxiety in my clients when they first come to me and frustration, why aren't my people doing what I want them to do, why aren't my, the people that signed up for my coaching program, why aren't they finishing it, so all of that. I listen with intention and with empathy to support them, but then it allows me the opportunity to provide really specific insight that's gonna help their unique situation. So that's been my journey and

Like, I love it.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (06:11.933)

Oh, I love that so much. There were some words that you used that I really wanna just kind of call back. And I think that the first couple of words was that it's not just effective training, but it's efficient training. Can you say a little bit more about what you mean and why that was important that you used those two specific words?

Carrie Graham, PhD (06:32.878)

Absolutely. So there are how I want people to think about this as a woman and as a business owner how many times have you received have you sat through a meeting sat through a call and you're thinking this is time I can't get back and it could have been in an email.

That is not a good use of people's time. It's definitely increases waste of resources. And so efficiency is really important to me. What are the things, what information are you sharing that's extraneous that people can consume on their own and make sense of it? Versus what is the bulk? Where's the meat of the message that really needs you to be in front of and needs intentional instruction?

Ashley Cox (she/her) (07:32.981)

I love that differentiation. It just keeps getting better and better. Every question, right? Every thing that you say. Because now we have not only effective and efficient training, but now it's the differentiation between what do I need to actively be engaged in and what can I create a system or a tool or a resource perhaps? Is that kind of the direction that you're going? Yeah.

Carrie Graham, PhD (07:58.045)

Yeah, that's exactly it. And, you know, it's the world, the world of a hack, you know, world of an online hack.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (08:04.342)

Mm-hmm.

Carrie Graham, PhD (08:06.778)

I can appreciate for small business owners how attractive it is. It appears that, you know, we look at hacks, right, that they, oh, it will save me money. It will save me time. It will really get the job done. Some may, most may not. And I caution people into thinking, you know, using that approach because as a small business owner, your resources are limited.

As so to be efficient, we really have to hone in on the outcome. What is the outcome that we're trying to get? How can we get there quickly and effectively? And then the added part is we need to make it so rich that the outcomes are long term as opposed to short term.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (09:00.021)

That's so good. That's so good because we don't want to have to keep training on the same thing over and over and over again because obviously that is not efficient. It's not a good use of your time as the business owner, the leader, and it's a waste of resources. It's a waste of money. It's a waste of time. It's a waste of brilliance that could be tapped into in every team member, not just the leader.

Carrie Graham, PhD (09:05.451)

Yes.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (09:26.365)

but every single individual. So when we ramp up that learning runway and it's more effective, it's more efficient, it's more resourceful, then we all win at the end of the day, right?

Carrie Graham, PhD (09:39.778)

Absolutely, absolutely. And that's the thing, you know, there's, I liken it to talking to children, right? And it's, sometimes you can say something to a child or a young person, and they don't get it. But you are repeating yourself over and over and over again. And it takes someone else or you to change your approach. And that one time, the message goes through.

So that's an example of where the efficiency of it and coupled with effectiveness, that's the way to go. That is the way to go. It just has a greater impact.

And it's not a way that a lot of people think, particularly about training. People often say, oh, more is better. No, less is more. Less is definitely more. But it's...

Ashley Cox (she/her) (10:40.041)

Oh, yes, that's so important. I think so many times we try to cram every single little thing. I call it the fire hose effect. Here's everything in my brain, let me shoot it out at you as quickly as possible and with as much force as possible and pray to God that something sticks and I don't have to do this again.

Carrie Graham, PhD (11:01.366)

Yeah, and that's, you know, in so many facets, that is an ineffective approach. It's stress provoking for you as the person that's gonna facilitate it, and that's a really special area of mine. But it's also, like, you're giving it all to everyone at the same time, but you have individuals, right? Like...

Ashley Cox (she/her) (11:07.517)

Mm-hmm.

Carrie Graham, PhD (11:27.51)

Okay, not everyone eats a bowl of peas out of a can. Yeah, we all might be hungry, but why would you serve up something and you don't know what allergies people have, what their interests are, are they even hungry? It's the same, it really is the same thing.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (11:49.077)

For sure, for sure. So kind of along this same vein, I'm feeling like we're starting to talk a little bit about mistakes that people make or misunderstandings or maybe even myths about those all turned out to be Ms. That was not planned. That worked out really well. I just didn't stop and give myself a kudo there. And I love alliteration, so that works really well for me. But what are some of the mistakes or misunderstandings or myths that people have about training and it sounds like obviously pouring it all out, you know, giving it all in the same serving size or the same serving of vegetable is definitely one of them. So what are some other things that people can kind of be like, oh, I might be doing that.

Carrie Graham, PhD (12:33.866)

Yeah, it's the one size fits all approach. And it's easy to look at something online or to purchase something from an external vendor, a training from an external vendor and say, okay, this is what we're gonna use. And it is in no way to say that item or that product isn't quality or effective, but you are not making it fit. You're not working to make it fit particular audience.

Carrie Graham, PhD (13:03.82)

So I would say using a one size fits all approach is another is something else. The other part of it is to make a training about the content as opposed to about the individual and this is something that I've been exploring more in the last nine months and it really is prevalent. It's a prevalent behavior that people will focus on. We have this governmental annual training that we have to do. Sexual harassment training, let's say, it's in order for us to get funding we have to perform it and so the training session is all about this is mandated, it's from the government, we have to do it to get funding. These are the definitions. This is an example of it, like in a vacuum. This is an example of it. This is the consequence.

It's performative and ineffective. But if you take that same required training and say, okay, how can I make this fit for my people? How can we get to the meat of the training through their lens using their utensils? I'm a little hungry right now, so pardon me. But, you know, it's that approach of not making it about the content. The content is what it is. If you've hired people, you've hired intelligent individuals, right? So give them, you know, acknowledge that part of it and then make it about them.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (15:05.105)

I love that. I want everybody to just pause and let this sink in for a minute because we have this so backwards. We have this so backwards. And I think it was perfect what you said that it's so often performative. We think about sexual harassment training. We think about anti-discrimination training. We think about anything in the diversity, equity, and inclusion space. It often is a checkbox training. I'm supposed to do this. I'm required to do this.

Carrie Graham, PhD (15:27.37)

Yep.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (15:33.161)

But what if you flip the script and it was a value-driven conversation versus a requirement-driven conversation? It can make all the difference in the way that people receive it, the way that they even show up. You hear it, right? Because the way you show up to mandatory training is what? Ugh. See, you all can tell we're friends, right? Same response.

Carrie Graham, PhD (15:49.727)

Absolutely.

Carrie Graham, PhD (15:55.105)

Ah.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (16:02.493)

But I bet that every single person listening had the same response. We've all sat in mandatory corporate training. I've had to deliver mandatory corporate training that was not given this kind of intentionality.

Carrie Graham, PhD (16:15.842)

Right, right. And not only is it a drain on the learner, the end user, but it's a drain on the facilitator because actually I cannot imagine you were excited. We're going to like everyone's going to be so ready and motivated. No, literally every individual involved is dreading the experience. They are not

Ashley Cox (she/her) (16:23.96)

Oh!

Carrie Graham, PhD (16:39.482)

focused intellectually from a heart perspective, it doesn't go well, but yet that is a practice that is continued to be used. And the other consequence of doing that is you have to repeat it because it doesn't stick. So now you have everyone is not doing their job because they're in the same training for the third time this year.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (16:57.173)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (17:10.138)

Mmm. So true.

Carrie Graham, PhD (17:12.63)

So there is a cost attached to inefficiency and ineffectiveness. And I get so angry when I hear that, you know, then this is from a corporate perspective, but when budgets are being cut, it also, it always typically starts with L&D or training. And for small businesses, it's the same thing. Yes, you have so many hats to wear in running your business, I beg of you please do not and I caution you not put your training on the back burner because it will come around and it will bite you again and again and again.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (17:45.79)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (17:56.277)

Ugh, I could not agree more. You know, most of the issues that I see come up in my work with clients is around ineffective or non-existent training. And it starts, it starts with orientation. It doesn't start once the person's been there five years.

Carrie Graham, PhD (18:07.63)

Thank you.

Carrie Graham, PhD (18:12.246)

Yeah.

Carrie Graham, PhD (18:16.887)

Yes, I recently was in a contract with someone with another agency and I was going through their onboarding for all the like 100 contractors that they hired and I'm like, this is a multimillion dollar project, and this is how you are onboarding your consultants? Oh my goodness. So you're right, it happens at that level, and it also happens at the local rest family run restaurant. You just need wait staff, so all you do is hire someone. You don't explain to them or share with them how the restaurant is connected to the community,

Ashley Cox (she/her) (18:54.793)

Yes.

Carrie Graham, PhD (19:07.12)

how the people that are being served impact and support the business. Like there is no conversation about that. Onboarding is a part of training. It's training the people about your culture.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (19:24.661)

Absolutely, and orientation is different than onboarding. And I don't think people understand that either. A lot of times people conflate the two terms to think, oh, it's the first week that someone's here. No, no, orientation is the first day, maybe two days, like welcome to the company, we're so glad you're here. Onboarding is the ongoing training, and I always tell people, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this too, Carrie, onboarding's a minimum of three months, 90 days, minimum.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (19:52.625)

And it can go up to and should go up to about the first year because you can't experience everything in a company until you've been with the company for one full year because we don't do every single thing every single day or every single month or every single quarter in our businesses. And people need an opportunity to be able to see and experience that in order to learn it.

Carrie Graham, PhD (20:12.718)

Absolutely.

100% agree with you. You know, the other part of it is when business owners are questioning, they pose the question to themselves, I don't know if I should have hired that person. It may or may not be a good fit, but you're months in. And so, you know, typically people are making, they're hiring individuals with the mindset of this is permanent. The individual will last the long haul with me and that is absent of what you're suggesting. Let's do a full year of onboarding not only for their benefit, the individual, but for your benefit, right? To say, you know, I'm a small business, things may evolve, I might need to, as we grow, I might need to add things or take things away. Your strengths lie, they don't just pop up on day one. They start to present over time and if they present over time you should be supporting the individual over time.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (21:18.617)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (21:29.021)

That's so beautiful. It's so beautiful. And it really is something I come back to every single time is we're people working with people at the end of the day. Like it really is that simple. We're people working with people. And while you may have been in your business for three years, five years, 10 years, whatever that person has not.

And have you ever started a new job? Do you remember how terrifying it is? It's like, oh my gosh, am I really cut out for this? Am I gonna be a good fit? I hope I don't let people down. Like you're so nervous and you have so much to learn and to absorb and if somebody is firehosing you and they're creating a one size fits all approach and they're doing some of these things that we've talked about, they're speaking to the content and not the individual, all these brilliant things that Carrie's mentioned already, how can we expect them to be at their

Carrie Graham, PhD (22:05.798)

So

Ashley Cox (she/her) (22:20.181)

peak performance level if they're just overwhelmed and inundated with so much stress and information internally and externally.

Carrie Graham, PhD (22:33.134)

Absolutely, absolutely. And so, I like to use myself as examples. You and I have been planning on having this recorded conversation for some time, and I woke up to some noise, and I'm like, what is that? And they're repaving my street. And so it was, okay, what do I do right now?

Am prepared for our recorded conversation. That's problem solving. Problem solving is a form of learning. I've never in my life been in a situation where they're paving my street, literally right in front of my street. I've never had that experience. So that was a learning experience. So the same holds true in business. When you're bringing people on, things pop up that you may not have anticipated and everyone is learning how do we problem solve through this. You know, it may some people when you're trying to problem solve their stress levels go up for others. You know, they you know the best of their personalities might not come out and so it's it takes time. It just takes time and you cannot like you said, fire those people and expect learning to still happen.

Carrie Graham, PhD (24:03.008)

it was like all the people who were in front of my house, they were so kind and they were moving kind of slow and I was backing out and they were like, we'll stop for you ma'am, right? So everyone had a calm approach.

It matters that interpersonal relationship. It doesn't go out the window now that you're doing training like customer service, like you're helping other people. Training and development is the same thing. It's the same thing. It's all to your point. It is all about the individual.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (24:44.309)

Exactly, and this is why it's so important not to wait to hire when you're completely overwhelmed and overloaded in your business. You have got to have the space and time to invest in the people that you're bringing on. And honestly, you owe it to them. You're the one that has the business, you're the one that put the job posting out there, you're the one saying, hey, come over here, I'm gonna give you some money in exchange for some work. And so at this point, like we have a deep,

Carrie Graham, PhD (24:51.597)

Yeah.

Carrie Graham, PhD (25:01.986)

Yeah.

Carrie Graham, PhD (25:10.287)

What?

Ashley Cox (she/her) (25:14.033)

seated responsibility and ownership to do our people justice, to do them right by taking the time necessary to slow down, prioritize, and deliver training that is intentionally designed to support that person in their new role.

Carrie Graham, PhD (25:33.358)

Absolutely, absolutely. You know, I wanna bring it back to something I said earlier.

Yes, I was a really shy child. And when I stepped into the faculty position, I was like, oh my goodness, this is, I was terrified. I was terrified. And I've presented at national and international conferences with a couple hundred people in my session. That is not where I love to be. And so when I think about people who now have to facilitate a training, that's why I say it's something

Ashley Cox (she/her) (26:01.705)

Mm-hmm.

Carrie Graham, PhD (26:09.584)

hold really dear to my heart because it can be anxiety provoking. It can be stressful. And even though you have the best of intentions when it gets going, you're like, no, here's the fire hose. Like that happened. And so I also want to tell people if that's you or share with individuals that if that's you, when you make the training about them, it takes the focus off you.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (26:38.846)

Mm.

Carrie Graham, PhD (26:40.734)

You don't have to be perfect because you are not the spotlight. The spotlight is Ashley. Ashley, why don't you tell me about your experience, your past experience related to this particular topic? So and so, why don't you tell me? That's not about you. That is about them and sharing their own experiences. So now you've got knowledge transfer in there, sharing their experience of saying, and it didn't work and here's why it didn't work. So now you're getting an innovative approach to a problem that exists. There are just so many benefits, so many benefits of being really intentional about your training programs.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (27:35.445)

I love that. And it feels so compassionate, right? It feels compassionate not only toward the individual that you're training, but it feels like self-compassion.

Carrie Graham, PhD (27:47.158)

Yes, yes, and it's easy. Ashley, it is easy. It is so easy. And I take the approach of...

Ashley Cox (she/her) (27:50.613)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Carrie Graham, PhD (27:56.598)

You know, I love to relax, but I recognize, you know, sometimes I have to work. But, you know, let's not shortchange effectiveness and efficiency, but let's make it easy. And so that's where having a clear strategy that fits your business. Not everyone else's, but it fits your business and your business needs. It's, it's a rinse and repeat because it's working. And when, and it should be a cyclical process and once it stops working or the outcomes are starting to decrease, it's an opportunity. Let's revisit what are some additional improvements we can make. And so that's easy as opposed to the stress, oh my goodness, I have these 12 trainings that I have to give, where am I going to get the time? No one's going to be interested. Now I got to have food because we'll be there for five hours when really it's only a one hour training.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (28:57.109)

Mm-hmm. So good. So good, Carrie. I think it really lends to the business owner who is being kept up at night by this. It's almost like a sigh of relief just listening. It gets to be easy. It gets to be easy. It gets to be easy. We're making this so much harder and more complicated.

And so what are some things that business owners need to know about adult learners? Like what are we maybe missing the mark on? So obviously one of them sounds like listening to what the person needs.

Carrie Graham, PhD (29:39.222)

Asking and then listening.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (29:40.745)

And not just like listening to respond, but listening to truly hear. What are you saying? What are you needing?

Carrie Graham, PhD (29:45.646)

Yep. Yep, yep. So I would say there's a couple of tenants around adult learners that are, it's well researched and backed in the academic and scholarly world. But I would say for your audience, the most important thing that you can leverage that is true about adult learners is that adult learners use their past experiences in the, I call it the learning table. So at the learning table. 

What I mean by that is, if you said, Carrie, I'm gonna train you on a new technical system, computer system, my past experience is that I'm always frustrated, that I don't like it, like it's not positive. So already, I've come to the training session with some level of stress.

And stress is a barrier to learn. It can be a barrier to learning. But there's also, once we're in a training, asking people about what their experiences are, they use it as a mental model. Oh, okay, so now Ashley wants to train me on how to, you know, customer service or what have you. I love people.

I love serving others. I have fond memories of it. Oh, you know what? I worked at a fast food restaurant growing up. I can use those, I can leverage those skills to working in a five-star restaurant, right? So there's always a piece of a person's past that can help them not only be motivated, but it shortens their learning time.

Carrie Graham, PhD (31:48.808)

I say that to offer when you're in a training, one of the things you can do is to ask, has anyone experienced this? What was your experience? Immediately, it takes the attention off you, it puts them on them, everyone else is looking to them like, well, what words your experience? And if you open the table for discussion, hey, you know what, I had that same experience, right?

Ashley Cox (she/her) (32:23.785)

and it becomes more of a conversation. Instead of I'm standing up here in the spotlight lecturing or reading this well-scripted training document and feeling like the perspiration around my brow and the racing heart and like everybody's looking at me to be the expert, to be the one that knows everything. But I love the beauty in broadening that and embracing

every learner around the table, whether it's one or five or 25 or however many are sitting at your learning table, to say, let's all share and let's benefit from that together.

Carrie Graham, PhD (33:03.598)

Absolutely, and that is so much more meaningful. People, you know, when you start having trainings similar to that, people are excited for the next one. And even if they're not excited, they are engaged.

Carrie Graham, PhD (33:17.674)

You know, so that leads, so that's the very first thing, tenant about adult learners that I would say, remember that, but that leads me into the three things that I encourage people to focus on. And the first is engagement. It's really important to get your audience to be engaged in learning. That does not mean entertained.

Carrie Graham, PhD (33:44.942)

It means engaged. So you can play all the games you want, but that's not when the game is over. So is their level of engagement. So when you can engage people in a meaningful way through discussion, through sharing, through saying how it impacts them, that's the engagement piece. So if they're engaged, they're now motivated to learn. And that's where the understanding of content and retention of content comes into play. 

Carrie Graham, PhD (34:11.346)

That's where all those strategies come in that we've been talking about, right? So how is the training constructed to support learning for all the different individuals who are present? I'm going to argue that we please get away from, oh well there's auditory and there's get away from that because that's it's not really helpful in this case but rather, Do you understand who your audience is? If you've got mixed generations, you might need to review the basics of a concept and then build people's collective learning, going from basic to more complex. You wanna do things that help people remember. And the reason is because we do what we remember. And that's the third piece of it. It's the application.

Carrie Graham, PhD (35:19.236)

And so just giving people the information and saying a prayer and hoping they go off and apply it accurately or are we providing them opportunities during the training to practice the application to make corrections with their application? So I call it ERA, E-R-A, it's engagement, retention, but it's comprehension and retention and then application.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (35:49.113)

And it's so simple in its execution. It's not rocket science. You don't have to have a $50 million training budget. Obviously that would be nice, but maybe unnecessary. And I think it really sounds like it's about understanding your audience, like you said, asking and listening for what they need, engaging them in that conversation.

Carrie Graham, PhD (35:51.558)

Yep.

Carrie Graham, PhD (36:01.711)

That was a nice clip.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (36:16.829)

And then, you know, the follow-up pieces, it's are they able to apply this? And I think to add something that I'm sure that you talk about as well is not making mistakes or failure wrong. Because I hear so many times from small businesses who are like, well, this person just can't get their job right. And I'm like, okay, tell me about it. What about their job are they not getting right? Well, I told them this thing that they had to do. Okay, how many times have they done it? Once.

Carrie Graham, PhD (36:28.226)

Yes, yes.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (36:45.353)

and they didn't do it right. And I'm like, that's not a lot of times. That's not a lot of times. Now, if they're doing it perpetually on and on and on over several months, there's a problem here. And I usually would say, okay, so how did you initially teach this person how to do this? What was their experience with this? How have you followed up? What kind of conversations have you had? You know, training isn't just

Carrie Graham, PhD (36:51.442)

It's not.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (37:10.173)

what happens in the moment of training. It's not just sitting at the learning table and saying, okay, here's the thing, but it's all the components that come before to set the person up for success like you've talked about and all the components that come after in the followup and the retention and the making sure that we're supporting our people end to end.

Carrie Graham, PhD (37:29.386)

Yeah, absolutely. Because if you if you give them what they need, not what you want them to have, not what you think they need, if you're providing them with truly what it is that they need to do their job, they're gonna do their job. Like that's

Ashley Cox (she/her) (37:41.726)

Hmm.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (37:51.932)

Yeah.

Carrie Graham, PhD (37:54.234)

That's all it is. It really, I don't like math, but it really is basic math. It really is basic math. That's what it is. That's exactly what it is.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (37:59.677)

Yeah. One and one is two.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (38:06.665)

Yeah, oh, for sure, for sure. Oh, Carrie, I feel like we could talk about this all day long. And I wish that we could. But I definitely think maybe we'll have you come back for round two. Once folks have a chance to listen to this conversation, I'm sure there's going to be questions. There's going to be follow ups. But how do you fill in the blank? And maybe we can go into some more specific examples and opportunities to really support people. But. But we've come to the end of today's conversation. I think this is a beautiful place to wrap up our conversation today. And we're at the final and I think everybody's favorite part of the show at this point, where we get to help paint the vision for the kind of impact our listeners could create with one key takeaway or thought or action item from our conversation today. And so I'd love for you to share something, whether it's a reminder of something you've already shared or something new that you haven't shared for our listeners.

Carrie Graham, PhD (39:05.562)

I would say the most meaningful because you have very busy, a very busy audience, I would say engage, don't entertain but truly engage from the heart, support their level of retention through comprehension and then support their application.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (39:27.493)

love that. Imagine the impact that a truly supported employee could have on your business, your community, and our world. Oh my goodness, such an amazing conversation, Carrie. Thank you so much for being here. I'd love for you to share with our listeners where they can connect with you to learn more, to possibly work with you. You're so brilliant and I know that you have some incredible resources out there for folks.

Carrie Graham, PhD (39:56.522)

You are so kind for having me, Ashley. Thank you. It truly is an honor to support small business women, business owners that are listening in. It really touches my heart to know that you're doing that great work. And I am here to also support them. And so it, my website is the best place to learn more about me as well as. So access some resources. Um, so it's Dr. Carrie Graham dot com. And I'm there. I'm ready to listen. My favorite thing, I'm ready to listen and peacefully listen and offer some support because again it's not about me. It's not about a one size fits all. I live my life by that. It is truly about you and what do you need.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (40:48.445)

I love that. Such a beautiful example of exactly what you teach, Carrie. So we will be sure to drop Dr. Carrie Graham's information in the show notes for you so that you can easily click over and explore all of her amazing resources and connect with her as well on social media and all the places that she hangs out and shares so much value and information in this world. So thank you again, Carrie, for being here. It's an honor and a pleasure to have you on the show.

Carrie Graham, PhD (40:52.968)

Enjoy.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (41:16.417)

It is absolutely such a gift to be able to share this type of training and information with the women out there who are pouring their hearts and souls into their businesses and deserve to have effective teams that they love working with. And thank you dear leader for tuning into our conversation today. I hope that you found it inspiring and helpful and easeful. Yes, so good. Thank you so much, Carrie.

Carrie Graham, PhD (41:42.381)

Yeah. Thank you Ashley for having me and to all of your listeners, please know that I'm cheering you on whether we connect or not. I am cheering for your success.

Ashley Cox (she/her) (41:55.454)

I love that. As always, it's an honor and a privilege to be here with and for you on your leadership journey.